Page 1736 - les-miserables

that Marius was cold. It caused the goodman unendurable
and irritating anxiety to feel so tender and forlorn within,
and only to be able to be hard outside. Bitterness returned.
He interrupted Marius in a peevish tone:—
‘Then why did you come?’
That ‘then’ signified: If you do not come to embrace me.
Marius looked at his grandfather, whose pallor gave him a
face of marble.
‘Monsieur—‘
‘Have you come to beg my pardon? Do you acknowledge
your faults?’
He thought he was putting Marius on the right road, and
that ‘the child’ would yield. Marius shivered; it was the de-
nial of his father that was required of him; he dropped his
eyes and replied:—
‘No, sir.’
‘Then,’ exclaimed the old man impetuously, with a grief
that was poignant and full of wrath, ‘what do you want of
me?’
Marius clasped his hands, advanced a step, and said in a
feeble and trembling voice:—
‘Sir, have pity on me.’
These words touched M. Gillenormand; uttered a lit-
tle sooner, they would have rendered him tender, but they
came too late. The grandfather rose; he supported himself
with both hands on his cane; his lips were white, his brow
wavered, but his lofty form towered above Marius as he
bowed.
‘Pity on you, sir! It is youth demanding pity of the old

1736 Les Miserables